Research

Conventional wisdom holds that centralization undermines public provision and political trust. In contrast, this study argues that centralization can serve as a critical mechanism for overcoming authoritarian legacies and improving local governance in emerging democracies. Taiwan provides a compelling case: during its authoritarian era, decentralization fostered inefficiency, clientelism, and corruption. By shrinking local elite capture, centralization makes local government more responsive to citizens' demands for public provision, which in turn enhances political trust. We assess this argument by analyzing Taiwan's 2010 centralization reform, employing a difference-in-differences design with six waves of the Asian Barometer Survey (2001–2022). Our results show that citizens in areas that underwent centralization enjoy better access to healthcare and greater perceived safety. Meanwhile, the centralization also led to an increase in local political trust. These findings highlight the often-overlooked potential of centralization to improve perceptions of public provision and strengthen political trust at the local level.

While previous research suggests that dynasty politics and gender quotas may undermine the symbolic representation of women, Taiwan combines both unfavorable conditions yet boasts one of the highest female political participation. We argue this is explained by gender quotas enhancing the competitiveness of female candidates, thereby fostering a role model effect during campaigns. Using a quasi-experimental design based on the implementation of gender quotas in Taiwan's local elections, we analyze data from five waves of the Asian Barometer Survey (2005–2022). Our findings show that quotas significantly increase political interest among female voters but do not impact political efficacy and gender attitudes. This study challenges prevailing perspectives by examining Taiwan's case and offers insights into how gender role models can emerge in electoral contexts.

Despite the shared Confucian culture and economic development trajectories, women in Taiwan currently enjoy a much greater socio-economic status than their counterparts in South Korea and Japan. This study investigates a potential factor contributing to this striking difference: the reserved seats for women in Taiwan’s local councils. The quota assignment rule creates a ‘zigzag’ proportional function of female councilors, providing a unique estimation opportunity. We find that exposure to female political leadership decreases the likelihood of mothers with two daughters opting for a third child, whereas no such an effect is observed among mothers with two children of other sex compositions, indicating attenuation in son preference. Additionally, we find that the gender quota encourages married women to take on a more active role in household decisions, and motivates female students to pursue a college major in law and political science, fields conducive to political involvement. These gender-specific effects lend support to the hypothesis that female political leaders serve as role models, enticing more egalitarian gender attitudes among women.

Party labels have traditionally been significantly important in elections. However, the recent influence of personalized politics has resulted in the de-labeling of candidates, even in grassroots-level village chief elections. This study explores the impact of (de) labeling on election outcomes, drawing from research on anti-party sentiment, negative partisanship, and the Citizen-Politician linkages theory. By analyzing data from four village chief elections held in Taiwan between 2010 and 2022. Our results reveal that “de-labeled” candidates tend to be non-incumbents in villages with lower population density, education levels, and income. In addition by utilizing Propensity Score Matching and the Two-way Fixed Effects model, our research shows that the de-labeling of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidates generally increases their vote share, while labeling has the opposite effect. Most notably, the (de) labeling of Kuomintang (KMT) candidates does not significantly influence election outcomes, whereas that of DPP candidates does have an impact. This finding may highlight the distinct nature of clientelism linkages prevalent within the KMT, in contrast to the programmatic linkages within the DPP.

This study explores how compulsory education helps narrow the gender gap in political participation. It argues that education greatly narrows the gap in resources and skills between men and women in politics. Also, as women get more education, their confidence in politics grows. These factors encourage more women to get involved in political affairs. To test this, the study uses data from the Taiwan Social Change Survey. It examines changes in political interest, political efficacy, and political participation among people before and after Taiwan extended its compulsory education. Preliminary findings show that women with more education experience much greater growth in political engagement than men with the same level of education. However, this growth has not yet led to higher levels of actual political participation.

Has populism in Taiwan fundamentally changed with the rise of Han Kuo- yu in 2018? While populist candidates exist among both major coalitions in the political arena, and to varying levels of success, populism is consistently considered a prevailing feature of the pan Green coalition. This study challenges this perspective, suggesting populism in Taiwan is nuanced and shaped by the intersection of partisanship and ethnic identity. Using Latent Class Analysis on waves 4 and 5 of the Asian Barometer survey, this study identifies the latent populist class in Taiwan and examines levels of support across partisan identity-based coalitions and ethnic identity using a combination of Multiple Imputation via Chained Equations, Multinomial Propensity Score Weighting, and Survey- Weighted Logistic Regression. Findings confirm that populist identification in Taiwan does indeed shift across partisan coalitions over time, and that these shifts are contingent upon both ethnic identity and partisan identity.

Does women's political participation lead to greater welfare for women? This typical question regarding the substantive representation of women has been the focus of numerous empirical studies in the past. However, most research has concentrated on members of parliament, mayors, or public representatives, with relatively little attention given to the impact of grassroots women's political participation. This study aims to address this research gap by analyzing the gender ratio in the selection of neighbor chiefs by village chiefs in Taiwan, using official statistical data on the gender of neighbor chiefs from various counties and cities. The study found that although only 19.87% of village chiefs in Taiwan are female, the proportion of female neighbor chiefs reaches 46.37%. Furthermore, female village chiefs are significantly more likely than their male counterparts to appoint female neighbor chiefs, with a difference of 3-4%. Another important finding is that this "spillover effect" is more pronounced in villages outside the six metropolitan areas, where female village chiefs appoint female neighbor chiefs at a rate 5.7% higher than male village chiefs. This finding is particularly significant for empowering female village chiefs in women's movements, suggesting that to increase the proportion of grassroots female neighbor chiefs, efforts should prioritize encouraging women to run for village chief positions in less urbanized community neighborhoods.

In Taiwan, villages are the most grassroots-level units, making village chiefs well-suited to driving community development. However, the gender gap in these local leadership roles remains a critical challenge. Through publishing the Handbook on Community Building and organizing empowerment training courses for women, the National Alliance of Taiwan Women's Associations (NATWA) has successfully seen 27 of its trainees elected as village chiefs during the 2018 and 2022 election cycles. Furthermore, three participants achieved election as township councilors, and one as a county councilor. To encourage female political participation at the grassroots level, the 2026 Training Camp for Female Village Chief Candidates is now open for registration. For more information, please visit: https://www.facebook.com/womenvillagechiefs